


The Sacrifice

by masswisteria



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-10
Updated: 2013-09-10
Packaged: 2017-12-26 05:03:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/961876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/masswisteria/pseuds/masswisteria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Doomed timeline Dave got to travel back in time and become Davesprite.  Rose got to stay behind until the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Sacrifice

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this](http://smashalash.tumblr.com/post/31341703877/i-like-to-imagine-the-timeline-collapsed-in-on) gorgeous art by [smashalash@tumblr](http://smashalash.tumblr.com/).

TG: im gonna go now  
TT: Good luck.

Rose stood over her bed, about to draw back the comforter and climb in when the small nest of assorted knittings caught her eye. She paused, considering. Each item in the pile had its own story, even if only Rose knew or remembered what it was. The shawl covering half the mound was a gift from Jade. The yarn was, at any rate; Rose preferred to think of that as being the same thing. It was the first gift she had received from someone she considered a “friend.” There was a lavender and gray hat, decorated with an “F” motif peaking out from underneath. It was inspired by one of Rose’s original characters, whose story it would now seem must go unwritten. The long scarf that snaked throughout the whole pile featured painstakingly knitted trite expressions of love and affection - lines copied from a Christmas card from her mother. It had been a particularly inspired counterattack in their unending war of passive aggression, or so Rose had thought at the time. It didn’t really matter now.

Rose opted for the makeshift nest.

Months of life in Sburb had trained her well. She was asleep - which is to say she was awake on Derse - moments after closing her eyes. Dave was on his way back to set the timeline on the proper path, and she was her dream self, ready to donate her memories towards the success of the other timeline. Rose let out a sigh. Her final task in this nightmarish game was now complete. Nothing to do now but wait for the inevitable.

She wondered what it would be like, even had a queer urge to chronicle it as it happened - because that would not be pointless at all. Would she see the universe slowly crumble around her, or would it blink out in an instant? Fade to black...or perhaps white? What was the color of nonexistence, anyway? Perhaps it had already begun; was the timeline doomed the moment Dave traveled back in time? Or would the two timelines advance in tandem in some strange way, with Dave’s time travel pinning his departure from this disastrous one to his arrival in the other? Contemplating this was beginning to give Rose a headache. Time was Dave’s domain, not hers, and even he had trouble understanding it. Not that he ever admitted it. “You just shouldn’t think about it too hard,” he would say, which was of course Strider-speak for “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

Rose rubbed at her eyes and was surprised when her hand came away wet. Well, she could allow herself a little sentimentality. It was not like there was anyone left to see. She looked around the Dersite projection of her bedroom, and her gaze landed on the half empty bottle next to her desk. Tempting though it was to wash these last moments - whatever they may bring - down in true Lalonde fashion, she decided against it. She was hoping that some part of her dream self would be passed on, after all. Rose did not want her gift to be incoherent drunken rambling and giggling. She sat down at her desk and opened Pesterchum on her laptop, absently rubbing at her temple. The chumroll was empty. Strider had left the building. Rose slumped down on her desk, resting her chin in one hand and tracing patterns on her touchpad with the other. When it came to inevitable doom, waiting was by far the worst part.

One errant finger twitch over a desktop icon later and Rose was staring at John’s bedroom. It was empty now. The imps seemed to have lost interest in the house after John’s demise. Though despite the darkness Rose could see they had certainly taken their time defiling the room before leaving. A few tattered scraps were all that remained of John Egbert’s treasured posters. Now all that decorated the walls was smears of inky, dark gods-only-knew-what. It shone faintly in the ambient light of the game world.

Rose’s laptop slammed into the wall with a crack and a crunch; the screen flickered as it hit the ground, then steadied. Rose stood there, panting, teeth clenched, staring at the display a moment longer. With a well-practiced flick of her wrists, she drew her thorns and obliterated the now worthless device. She was done. She stepped back from the desk and nearly tripped over her toppled chair. Rose kicked it across the room before blasting it into splinters. She was so fucking done. Her desk met the same fate. Done with this game. With this universe. Shining darkness tore across her bedroom, shattering door, plaster, and bookshelves alike, filling the room with a deafening roar. Done with whatever sick perversion of intelligence thought up this system. So. Fucking. Done.

Rose dropped to her knees, still panting. Her throat was raw. The room was eerily quiet now that she was no longer ripping it apart. Now that she was no longer screaming. A glint of light caught her eye: the bottle from her mother’s stash, miraculously untouched by her outburst. She let her weapons fall from her hands and crawled towards the bottle. She picked it up then fell sideways back into the knit pile. She had brought the bottle - vodka of unknown quality, though probably fairly good, knowing her mother - up to her room shortly after she and Dave had realized that without John and Jade there truly was no hope for them. Losing her friends had been bad enough; thinking it was all in vain was unbearable. Thankfully, she had enough sense to tell Dave about her big plan to follow in her mom’s footsteps - make it a family tradition! - and he had enough sense to tell her she was being an idiot, and thus the bottle remained unopened. But now Dave was gone, and she was alone. Rose cracked the seal.

The vodka burned briefly against her raw throat, then faded to a pool of heat as she swallowed. It tasted like...nothing, really. Just warmth and wetness, rather anticlimactic. Rose had expected...she was not sure what she had expected. Something worse or something better. Something more, certainly. Something that would have explained her mother’s compulsion. It smelled like her. Rose took another drink, and let her tears fall.

It had gotten warm in the room. Rose kicked the shawl off her legs, but it wasn’t enough. She rolled onto her stomach and reached across the carpet for one of her thorns. After only taking three tries to pick up the weapon, she fired a single dark blast towards her window. The glass remained stubbornly in place, but the new hole three feet to the side of the window was now letting in plenty of air. Rose flopped back onto her back and giggled, one hand still firmly gripping the half empty bottle.

There was a faint tingle in her mind now, tickling at the edges of feeling. Like a phantom limb sparking false sensations in some otherwise dormant part of her mind. Rose imagined a giant ghost arm reaching out of the top of her head, and fell into another fit of giggling. The sensation grew stronger, and some dim part of Rose thought that maybe it was finally starting. Her vision was fuzzy, but that might have just been the vodka. The tingle grew to a buzz, felt more than heard in her ears. She held her hand up over her face and could see it oscillating in and out of focus in time with the noise within her head. Rose’s heart beat faster and the bottle slipped from her fingers and dammit, wasn’t alcohol supposed to make you brave? She had a moment to berate herself over her cowardice before the next wave hit her, scattering her thoughts. A jolt of pain shot through her temples, down her spine, and out through seemingly every nerve ending in her body. Another wave and another jolt followed, setting her skin aflame, and Rose screamed. Around her the house - or the planet, or the universe - was shaking. She had accepted death, but she wasn’t prepared for this. Each cycle came quicker than the one before. Her screams became desperate gasps for air in between convulsions. This was not fair. She was here, alone, the sacrifice, and her only reward was pain. The waves bled together into one continuous shock tearing through her mind. Rose begged for it to end, whether in words or just in thoughts, she could not say and did not care. She just wanted it to be over. She wanted to have her friends back. She wanted to be sitting at home, knitting and inventing stories. She wanted her mother. But there was only the pain.

And then that too was gone.


End file.
